Now, at the season's three-fourths point, can December offer a clean sweep?

Basically, with the exception of Baltimore, all of the AFC wild-card and AFC East contenders, including New England, have a relatively easy quartet of remaining games. In the end, the playoffs could be out of Patriots' hands, but they have an excellent chance to start that push Sunday in Seattle.

Even in the mediocre-to-quite-bad NFC West, the Seahawks themselves have been eliminated from playoff contention with a 2-10 record.

Seattle has really struggled this year; the team's only two wins came against fellow divisional also-rans, St. Louis and San Francisco.

Much like New England, the Seahawks have been a perennial playoff participant, but now are a veteran team that has really been strapped with injuries this year. It almost makes one feel happy about the Patriots and where they are.

Almost.

Up and down the list of metrics, 2008 Seattle is a poor team. They are in the bottom third of most statistical categories. Perhaps worst among them, the Seahawks are averaging nearly 130 total yards less per game than their opponents.

Even the home turf, always known as one of the toughest places to play, hasn't provided sanctuary. Seattle is 1-5 at home this year.

The Seahawks have seen their quarterback(s) and receivers go down, but I look at a more recent loss. Before the Thanksgiving Day game in Dallas, Seattle put center Chris Spencer on injured reserve. The Seahawks rushed for just 80 yards and allowed seven sacks in that rout.

On Sunday, I expect Matt Cassel and Co. to exploit a dismal pass defense and I think Vince Wilfork, going against a backup center, can halt Seattle's rushing game and force Matt Hasselbeck to try and improve on his 57.8 passer rating.

On thing tempering my opinion is that the Seahawks, too, like Pittsburgh the week before, will have ten days to prepare for New England. Coach Mike Holmgren has said this is his final season. I wouldn't be surprised to see him really step on the offensive accelerator and go for broke to delight the now-unhappy Seattle fans once more.

Lastly, the early forecast, unsurprisingly, calls for rain. After the Steelers game, will Randy Moss remember how to catch in a downpour?

In the end, though, I say the Patriots take a step closer to the playoffs behind a convincing offensive effort.